20 Years of 'Tomb Raider'

The Best of Tomb Raider

It’s been nearly two decades since Lara Croft broke up the video games boys club with Tomb Raider and became an instant pop-culture icon. Since then, the fearless British archaeologist has conquered games, comics, movies (Oscar-winner Alicia Vikander will soon strap on the boots previously worn by Angelina Jolie) and even entered the Guinness World Records as “the most successful human videogame heroine.”

Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration is out this week, which brings last year’s excellent Rise of the Tomb Raider to PlayStation 4 for the first time and includes all the game’s downloadable content, as well as several new modes and additional extras (the new content is also available as downloads on Xbox One and PC).

To commemorate the anniversary, EW asked developer Crystal Dynamics to do a little archaeology of its own and comb through Lara’s illustrious history to pick five of her most exciting, iconic and defining video game moments. These excerpts and many more are collected in the forthcoming book 20 Years of Tomb Raider: Digging up the Past, Defining the Future, which will be available October 25.